Gambit
by Madame Estrella
Summary: Part Three of The Pretender Labyrinth Series, post IOTH


Category: JMPAFR/LA  
  
Rating: PG-13 Spoilers: Up to IOTH Summary: Part three of the Labyrinth Series. Disclaimer: I do not own any of these characters and am just playing around with them.  
  
Gambit by Madame Estrella  
  
"Miss Parker, there's something you should see in the lobby." Broots said urgently. Miss Parker looked up at him, slightly annoyed.  
  
"What is it?" She snapped. Broots shifted uneasily on his feet.  
  
"Just come with me, please?" She rose from her seat and followed him to the sweeper filled hallway.  
  
She had a sudden touch of deja vu when she saw some men dragging in another through the front door. Lyle sneered at her and then looked at the captured man with a smug grin. Jarod's head rose and he made eye contact with Miss Parker as her breath caught in her throat.  
  
Lyle motioned for the sweepers to bring Jarod closer and Jarod shot Lyle a menacing glare. He turned his attention to Miss Parker and then suddenly lunged forward and took her face into his cuffed hands and kissed her voraciously. Miss Parker froze and the sweepers and Lyle tore Jarod away from her.  
  
Lyle shouted for them to take Jarod to SL-18 and they continued to drag him down the hallway. Miss Parker absently touched her lips with her fingers and waved away Sydney's hands as he touched her shoulders and then marched away.  
  
She hurried down the hallway and into her office, making sure the doors were closed behind her. She then brought her hand to her lips again and took the key out of her mouth and studied it carefully. Her hard expression broke into a smile.  
  
"Jarod, what the hell are you doing now?" She said to herself.  
  
Miss Parker turned around suddenly as Sydney and Broots entered her office. She quickly shoved the key into her pocket.  
  
"Miss Parker, we've been summoned to the conference room." Sydney said as Broots shifted nervously.  
  
"By Raines?" She asked calmly. Somehow the key in her pocket told her that no harm would befall them today.  
  
"Yes." Sydney replied solemnly. She followed the men out the door and to the conference room. Each step they took she could tell the men became more uneasy. She only felt her confidence grow.  
  
They took seats opposite Lyle, Raines and Amaru, the new Triumvirate watchdog who took the head seat.  
  
"Well, it seems that Lyle has succeeded in returning Jarod to the Centre." Raines said giving Miss Parker a grim look.  
  
"So now is the time for the public executions?" Miss Parker replied coolly. Broots gulped noisily.  
  
"No. I want you to work with Lyle to search through Jarod's last lair."  
  
"Why?" Miss Parker asked, feeling a gush of confidence and smiling slightly.  
  
"Because, the stolen DSA's weren't recovered when Jarod was captured." Raines shot a cold look at Lyle. Miss Parker smiled at Lyle. She now had an idea where the key would lead her.  
  
"Anything you say." She grinned confidently.  
  
********  
  
Miss Parker, Broots, Sydney, and Lyle dug through Jarod's lair with the sweeper team.  
  
"So this is what one of Jarod's active lairs looks like." Sydney said, almost awed. Lyle nodded his head and Miss Parker and Broots kept to themselves having both been within an active lair themselves.  
  
Jarod was a lot more disorganized while he was working. They were used to seeing the carefully laid out work he left for them when they arrived on his trail.  
  
This place was strewn with candy wrappers and pop-tart boxes along with the packaging of the fad item of the moment, which appeared to be those electronic key chain pets. Miss Parker could only guess what the final result of that would have been.  
  
Miss Parker saw a telephone book lying open to a section on storage. She picked this up and eyed the various advertisements for self-storage facilities. She remembered the key and discarded the book before the others had seen her looking at it.  
  
The key to this mystery was in one of those storage containers. She shuddered at the thought of what had happened the last time that Jarod had led her and Lyle to one of those.  
  
******  
  
Miss Parker arrived at the fifth storage place on her list. She was growing tired of this. Even when he was back in the Centre Jarod still had her running on a wild goose chase.  
  
"Welcome to Weston Storage, ma'am." The man behind the counter said cheerily.  
  
"Thank you. I have a friend who may have rented a storage container here his name is Jarod." She said skipping the small talk and getting right to the point. After five times, talking weather with the yokels was getting annoying.  
  
"Jarod?" The man asked, eyeing her curiously.  
  
"Yes, he's 6'3", has dark brown hair, brown eyes." She said.  
  
"Does he have a last name?" The man asked, fidgeting behind the counter.  
  
Miss Parker sighed. Yeah, he has a couple hundred of those. She closed her eyes and hoped for the best.  
  
"Russell." She said, remembering his parent's last name.  
  
"Yep! Right here, Jarod Russell. He's a friendly guy, helped me upright my soda machine after some punk teenagers pushed it over for kicks!" He grinned. Miss Parker smiled with relief.  
  
"He sure is a friendly guy." She replied.  
  
"His box is S-27. I haven't got a spare key, though." The man said.  
  
"That's okay, he gave me one." She said holding up the key and trying not to think too hard about how he'd given it to her. "Thank you." She said, exiting.  
  
She walked down the rows of storage buildings until she faced S-27. A small one, she thought. She opened the lock and pulled the door open. She glanced inside and was taken aback.  
  
A silver case, a brown leather bag, and a black leather jacket were the only objects inside. She crouched on the ground and opened the silver case to find it had a monitor and DSA's inside.  
  
"My God." She sighed. "He handed it right to me."  
  
Why would he give her the key? Why would he turn these things over to her? Why do that when he knew she'd take them back to the Centre and hand them over to Raines?  
  
Because it was Raines she would be giving it to. He was giving her the chance to stick it to both of them. Leave these things here and neither one would ever know what became of them and Lyle would have to answer for not recovering them with Jarod.  
  
She smiled satisfied as she closed the door and relocked the padlock. She put the key in her pocket and headed back to her car.  
  
******  
  
"Why can't I see him?" Sydney shouted. Lyle stood his ground and smiled.  
  
"Like I said before, it's not my call. Raines has restricted access to Jarod to anyone but himself and myself." Lyle replied.  
  
"What are you doing to him?" Sydney seethed with hatred in his eyes.  
  
"Jarod has information that we require. After that he'll be reeducated and returned to your care." Lyle said.  
  
"I know him! I should be talking to him!" Sydney shouted again. Lyle rolled his eyes; he wasn't getting anywhere with the old man.  
  
"The Triumvirate is still wary of you, Sydney. They have suspicions that you've been helping Jarod all these years. They think so, and so do Raines and I." Lyle said turning on his heel. "Allowing you access to Jarod would be a huge liability and very bad for you should he escape again." Lyle called over his shoulder as he disappeared around the corner.  
  
He could imagine Sydney standing there and saying awful things about him, but then didn't they all? He'd finally caught Jarod and he wasn't about to let him escape again. Turn him over to the "Dream Team" and Jarod would be out in a half-hour.  
  
Lyle asked his secretary to bring him coffee and then went into his office and took a seat at his desk. He reached into a drawer and pulled out a file on Jarod's reeducation, and something that had attached itself to it slipped out and onto the floor.  
  
He reached over and picked it up and saw what it was. An envelope marked Sleepwalk. He opened this and pulled out the photographs and looked over each one.  
  
God would she be pissed if she knew what was going on here. Lyle traced the outline of the woman's face with his finger. He hoped she wouldn't find out about this before he needed to call on her. He could live with her anger, but he still needed her to be in if this plan were to succeed.  
  
He sighed and put the photos back into the envelope and dropped it back into the drawer. Just as he was closing it, Miss Parker came crashing through the doors.  
  
"What the hell are you doing, Lyle?" She shouted.  
  
"You've obviously talked with Sydney." He replied, not bothering to reprimand her on her manners.  
  
"Yeah I talked with Sydney! I want you to allow access to Jarod for him right now!" She fumed. But that wasn't all. He knew it wasn't. She'd been keeping something from him.  
  
She and Jarod had secrets they kept between them, and he didn't like that. He knew that they had some sort of secret alliance between them. He wasn't surprised, but he didn't like it. He knew that she knew more about what was going on with the missing DSA's as well. It wasn't just because she'd slipped off and back to Jarod's last lair today, but also because he could feel it.  
  
"Then he told you that I have no say in the matter." Lyle replied matter of factly.  
  
"If you did anything..." She began and he cut her off.  
  
"Then what, sis? Are you going to crawl down the air vents to cuddle your little Pretender and kiss his wounds to make them better?" Lyle snapped. He did it partly because he wanted to see the look on her face, but also because he knew that's what she had been thinking.  
  
"He must have gotten you really hot and bothered the other day in the lobby when we brought him in. You must just be itching to get down there and see him." He finished, leveling his icy stare with hers.  
  
"Sydney has a connection with Jarod." She said after a long pause. "If anyone should be taking care of Jarod's reeducation in the Centre, it's Sydney."  
  
"But this little visit isn't about Sydney and you and I both know it." Lyle replied.  
  
Lyle's secretary interrupted them as she brought his coffee in to him. He accepted it graciously and watched Miss Parker leave soundlessly. This was far from over, and he knew it would be a struggle the whole way.  
  
*****  
  
"Broots!" Miss Parker shouted as she entered the sim lab. Broots nearly jumped out of his skin and Sydney only eyed her cautiously.  
  
"Ye-yes, Miss Parker?" Broots stammered and then looked for something to shield himself with.  
  
"I want you to find out who Lyle's new girlfriend is." She hissed. The two men regarded her curiously.  
  
"What, Miss Parker?" Sydney asked.  
  
"Lyle has a new squeeze and I want to know not only who she is but everything else about her as well."  
  
"But why?" Broots asked.  
  
"Don't ask why?! I have my reasons! This is the Centre and things aren't so great since Mr. Parker kicked so we all have to find a new way to survive." She said glaring at the tech. Sydney looked at her taken aback.  
  
"You're not going to hurt the poor woman, are you?" Broots asked.  
  
"Ha!" Miss Parker snorted. "Any woman who gets involved with Lyle is not to be pitied in my book, or did you forget about Bridgitt?" She growled and then left the sim lab.  
  
"Lyle must have really pissed her off." Broots sighed and then started hammering away at his keyboard as Sydney watched over his shoulder.  
  
******  
  
"Why do you do this?" Jarod seethed, staring up at Lyle from the concrete floor. Lyle adjusted the jumper cable on the sponge and was getting ready to hook up the leads to the battery.  
  
"Because the Centre can't afford to let those DSA's fall into the wrong hands." Lyle stated plainly, in his businesslike manner.  
  
"Whose hands are those?" Jarod said sarcastically. "The police, the FBI?" Lyle merely shook his head at him.  
  
"Do you seriously believe that the Centre is the only game in town?" Lyle replied. "There are other organizations just like the Centre, only some of them are much worse."  
  
"That would be hard to imagine." Jarod snapped.  
  
"No, not really." Lyle replied. He finished hooking the leads up to the battery and turned to Jarod. The door opened and Raines walked in.  
  
"I'll take it from here, Lyle." The old mad wheezed. Lyle nodded and held out the cables in his gloved left hand.  
  
"What? Are you working in shifts now?" Jarod growled. Raines took the cables and turned his gaze toward Jarod.  
  
"You will tell us where the DSA's are, Jarod." Raines smiled as he approached the man lying on the floor.  
  
******  
  
"Found anything on Lyle's woman yet, Broots?" Miss Parker demanded as she walked back into the lab. Broots looked at her nervously.  
  
"Nothing, Miss Parker. Are you sure he has a girlfriend?" He replied cringing.  
  
"Oh, I know." Miss Parker said. "I can feel it."  
  
"Your inner sense tells you so?" Sydney asked.  
  
"Yeah, I guess it may be that. I just got this feeling when I was in Lyle's office a month ago. He was writing a letter and he said sarcastically that it was to his girlfriend. But, something inside told me it wasn't sarcasm. He really felt something for someone other than himself and that took me for surprise."  
  
"Then why don't you ask him about her?" Broots asked. Miss Parker glared at him.  
  
"What?" She snapped.  
  
"Well, he is your twin brother. Maybe you could invite him and his lady to dinner with you?" Broots said. "But perhaps that would be too easy." He finished upon seeing her disapproving glare.  
  
"Or perhaps you can go into his office and find that letter." She snapped and then turned on her heel and left the room. Broots sighed and looked at Sydney.  
  
"You know, sometimes I just wish that I'd stuck with my paper route." Broots said as he stood and left the room.  
  
******  
  
The phone rang in Lyle's office and he picked up the receiver.  
  
"This is Lyle." He said.  
  
"Hello, Lyle." The voice said. Lyle's face registered his surprise, but he kept his voice even.  
  
"What do you want?" Lyle replied.  
  
"I want your help. You owe me, Lyle." The voice replied.  
  
"Yes, I suppose I do. This is probably not a good time." Lyle said.  
  
"No, I suppose you're right. Just know I'm going to be calling in some hefty favors soon." The voice answered and then the line went dead. Lyle placed the receiver back into its cradle and rose from his seat. He turned off the lights as he left the office.  
  
Five minutes later, Broots entered the room. He crouched at any noise and finally ended up nervously crawling on the floor to Lyle's desk.  
  
He carefully opened drawers and examined their contents. After he'd looked through each one, and turned up nothing, he slowly crept away from the desk in defeat.  
  
He finally stood and was walking toward the door when he heard a hissing sound. He threw himself to the ground and then slowly rose when he realized the hiss sounded like a voice in the vent.  
  
He approached the vent and looked at it curiously.  
  
"Hello?" He whispered.  
  
"I have something for Miss Parker." Angelo's voice replied. Broots knelt in front of the vent and took the object that was pushed through. It was an envelope.  
  
Broots opened the envelope and found that it contained a few DSA's. He looked back up.  
  
"Thank you, Angelo." Broots whispered.  
  
"Yes, thank you, Angelo." Lyle said. Broots whipped his head about to meet Lyle's angry gaze. "You have something for me?" Lyle said, extending his hand. Broots handed him the envelope and DSA's and sulked out of Lyle's office.  
  
Lyle went to his desk and sat in his chair. He opened the DSA player and dropped the disc in and the screen jumped to life. Now he had something on Miss Parker. Some of the secret information that Angelo was passing on to her stooge squad and Jarod.  
  
The images that came on the screen would haunt him for the rest of his life.  
  
The bottom left corner of the screen read Bobby and then for Centre use only.  
  
******  
  
"Well?" Miss Parker asked impatiently. It was the following morning and Broots couldn't help but notice that both the Parker twins looked worse with each passing day.  
  
"I've found something, but it's not about a girlfriend." Broots replied.  
  
"What is it then?" Miss Parker snapped.  
  
"Angelo tried to give me some DSA's, but Lyle took them." He stammered.  
  
Miss Parker slammed her fist on her desk.  
  
"Well, take them back!" She snapped.  
  
"It's not that easy. I left the office and then I heard Lyle shouting something inside."  
  
"What was he shouting?" Miss Parker said each word slowly, angrily.  
  
"I didn't really catch all of it. Something about damn Raines, damn the Centre." Broots said with the puzzled look from the previous evening returning to his face. Miss Parker's expression became questioning.  
  
"Where is my baby brother?" She asked with a saccharine sweetness.  
  
******  
  
Miss Parker entered the Blue Moon Tavern and approached Lyle at his table. He looked up at her from over his glass as he traced its rim with his finger. She took a seat across from him.  
  
"I didn't know you liked to drink, baby brother. Maybe we could have been fast friends over a bottle of whiskey at lunch. Oh, that's what we're doing right now." She grinned and gave the waitress her drink order.  
  
"What do you want?" He grumbled. Miss Parker was taken aback. She'd never seen her brother drunk before and found it surprising that he was so similar to her when she was.  
  
"A truce. Broots told me you came onto some disturbing information last night." She smiled. Lyle sighed and gave a short laugh.  
  
"I should have known that little yes-man of yours was still cowering outside my office." Lyle said.  
  
"That's what cowering little yes men of mine do. So, what did Angelo show you?" She asked.  
  
Lyle glared at her and rose from his seat. He threw a few bills on the table and looked down at her.  
  
"You should thank your God that you haven't seen the things I have and know the things I know." He growled. "Enjoy your lunch." With that said, he left the bar.  
  
Miss Parker accepted her drink and fumed at Lyle, the Centre, and Jarod. Jarod, even back in the Centre he still made her ulcer ache. She'd gone back and forth on the issue of turning over his belongings for days now. Why hadn't she?  
  
For that matter, why hadn't he told them? Surely they must be doing terrible things to him. Yet, he hadn't pointed a finger or said her name. Loyalty. That's what it came down to. Loyalty ... and Love. He'd told her that he loved her that day. He'd actually said the words.  
  
Something she couldn't do. If she said those words, allowed herself to feel the way he wanted her to ... the way she wanted to. No, those feelings were too dangerous. She would just have to go on refilling the Goofy Pez dispenser she secretly kept in her desk and doing just as he'd said.  
  
******  
  
Lyle had looked on for a week as they tortured him. Raines was in charge, of course, asking the questions and then prompting the sweeper to administer the blows. It didn't matter what they did to him Jarod wasn't giving up.  
  
Lyle heard that rhyme in his sleep now. Cree Craw, Toads Foot, Geese Walk Barefoot. He woke in the middle of the night drenched in sweat saying those words.  
  
He didn't understand why Miss Parker didn't stop it. Wouldn't stop it. She had the key, he knew that now. He'd seen it in his dreams, as clear as a memory he'd never had.  
  
"Hey, ease up a little, we don't want to kill the guy." Lyle said to Willie. The sweeper looked at him in disgust and then at Raines. Raines only nodded and said the words in his wheezing, raspy voice.  
  
"Clean him up." Raines barely gave Jarod a passing glance as he wheeled his oxygen tank out the door.  
  
Lyle heard that too in his dreams. Squealing wheels and Jarod's screams. He didn't want this. He remembered all too clearly being the one locked away, screaming. He shook his head.  
  
Jarod looked up at him with hate in his eyes. All Lyle could think was, 'I'm in love with his sister'. He gave Jarod a sinister grin, as the man would be expecting, and walked out of his cell.  
  
Once they'd broken Jarod, they would reeducate him. Reeducate. The images on those DSA's flashed through Lyle's mind like lightning. He hadn't been able to escape them. He could only imagine what would have happened if Miss Parker had actually seen them.  
  
Lyle began to walk to his office. The Centre already had too many monsters.  
  
*****  
  
Emily jumped as she felt the buzzing. She gathered her wits and realized it was the pager she wore. The pager that only one person knew the number to.  
  
"Not now!" She whispered to herself. "I'm not ready to do this yet!"  
  
She looked at the pager and dialed the number into the cell phone he'd given her.  
  
"Hello?" Came his voice.  
  
"Um, hi." She said, not sure what she was supposed to say. "You paged me?"  
  
"Yes, Emily." He said and she heard him draw a long breath. "I've captured Jarod."  
  
"You what?" She asked and then became immediately enraged. "What did you do to him, you bastard?"  
  
"He's being held on SL-18 in cell 18-A15. Are you getting this?" He asked. She grabbed a pen and paper.  
  
"SL-18, cell 18-A15." She repeated as she wrote it down.  
  
"The security relays for that sublevel are turned off for maintenance on Sundays from 2015 to 2055. There is adequate ventilation to the cell. There are three sweepers in the area at all times."  
  
She scribbled on the pad madly.  
  
"Okay." She said finally. She heard the line go dead and felt slightly put off. She sighed and tried to absorb the information and decide what she would say before giving the information to her father.  
  
She decided that she would send him an anonymous email. Otherwise she had no idea how she would explain how she'd gotten the information in the first place.  
  
*****  
  
"Dad! You got a message!" Jordan called from the living room. Major Charles entered the room and looked at the laptop screen.  
  
"Refuge." Major Charles said, reading the subject line.  
  
"Isn't that the code that Jarod and Sydney use?" Jordan asked. Major Charles nodded. He opened the file.  
  
"My God!" Major Charles gasped. "They have him." He read the information about the security and location.  
  
"Are we going to get him out?" Jordan asked.  
  
"You're damn right we are." Major Charles replied grimly.  
  
*****  
  
Miss Parker peeked around the corner and watched the sweepers. Go, go, she thought. They finally moved down the hall to patrol and she ran to the door. She punched in the access code she'd found in her office that afternoon. The door opened and she walked inside.  
  
"Jarod." She sighed as she saw him curled up on the bunk. She numbly walked over to him and sat on the bunk beside him. "What did they do to you?"  
  
He looked up at her once he'd realized she was there. He was covered in bruises, scratches, and cuts. He leaned up a little but she placed a hand on his chest and gently pushed him down.  
  
"Don't try to move. Oh my God, I can't believe they did this to you." She breathed.  
  
"I can." He whispered. "This is what they did to me last time." He looked at her sadly. She thought for a moment and remembered when they'd held him at the Centre after he'd been captured saving her. They'd purposely kept her away.  
  
"Do you still have it?" He said. She nodded her head and he smiled a little. "They don't know, not even suspect it?" He asked.  
  
"No." She said. It was a lie. Lyle had accused her of keeping information from him, but she didn't see the need to place any more worry on Jarod. She moved closer to him and stroked his hair and face gently.  
  
"I'm trying to get Sydney in here." She said. He looked at her curiously.  
  
"How did you get in?" He asked.  
  
"I found the access code and snuck in." She said, smiling a little. Here she was again, sneaking around in the Centre to steal time with Jarod. He smiled back.  
  
"Just like the good old days." He said and grimaced a little. He reached over and took one of her hands in his. "I'm glad you came."  
  
She held his face in her hand and leaned toward him and kissed him gently. She pulled back and looked in his eyes. He pulled her back with his free hand and they began kissing.  
  
"Get him ready for the treatment." A voice commanded in the hallway. They both looked toward the door.  
  
"I don't like the sound of that." Miss Parker snapped. She looked back at Jarod.  
  
"You need to get out of here, Marion." Jarod said. Her eyes widened at the sound of her name and she sat up.  
  
"Relax, I've got this one down." She said getting off the bunk and pulling herself beneath it. He felt the bunk lower slightly as she lifted herself off the floor and against the mattress.  
  
The door opened and she sweepers came in and grabbed him. They tore him from the bunk and dragged him from the room. Miss Parker sighed heavily as she pulled herself from under the bunk. She was going to make Lyle and Raines pay for this.  
  
*****  
  
Lyle watched Miss Parker emerge from the cell on the security monitor. She looked around and quickly moved off screen.  
  
"Like a moth to the flame." He said to himself.  
  
He looked back at his DSA player and scrolled through the images on the DSA once again. It never got easier to see.  
  
He could imagine what Jarod thought as he went through his archives. But Jarod had known about them. He probably remembered everything that had happened to him before he'd watched the DSA's. They must be like home movies.  
  
Lyle pulled the disc from the player and put it in his pocket before he left his office. He would observe once again.  
  
******  
  
Emily stopped the van a quarter mile from the Centre. She watched absently as Major Charles and Ethan grabbed a bag and pulled ski masks on. Jordan opened his laptop and pulled up the screen to the Centre monitors he'd hacked into.  
  
She was to sit and wait with Jordan while they retrieved Jarod. It ate at her. They didn't think she was strong enough, good enough to help in any way but driving the getaway car.  
  
She could have gone into the Centre and brought Jarod out by herself. She could have done it without ever telling the Russell men what she was doing. But there would have been questions that she wouldn't have wanted to answer.  
  
For whatever reasons Lyle had told her how to rescue Jarod. She had to hope that one of those reasons was that he was changing. But he'd captured Jarod to begin with. Why would he go to the trouble of bringing Jarod in, and then letting him go?  
  
She knew the reason for that. He'd meant to bring Jarod back. Self- preservation was always at the top of Lyle's list. He brought Jarod back to fulfill the Centre agenda. He probably even meant to keep Jarod there.  
  
So what made him let Jarod go? Something had to have happened. The Centre was probably doing something to Jarod that Lyle disagreed with. That was, after all, why he'd asked her to help him rescue the child.  
  
"We'll be back soon." Major Charles said, interrupting her thoughts. She nodded and Ethan and Charles hopped out of the van and closed the door. Now she waited.  
  
******  
  
Jarod lay on his bunk, staring at the ceiling. A million thoughts raced in his mind. A central one came back to the key. He would get out of here, somehow. But how would he retrieve the key from Miss Parker?  
  
He decided to think about simple things, like his escape. He had to work on the timing. He'd figured out the schedule of the sweepers when they patrolled and changed shifts. He'd even figured out the schedule of Raines' 'interrogations.' They were all meant to be random, but people were creatures of habit and no where was that more evident than at the Centre.  
  
He heard a sound in the vent and looked at it curiously. Then he saw something move.  
  
"Angelo?" He whispered. He heard someone clear his throat.  
  
"Um, no, son. It's your father, and Ethan." Major Charles whispered back. Jarod's expression became one of pure jubilation.  
  
"Dad! How did you know?" He whispered excitedly. He looked at the door and then back up at his father, who with Ethan's help was opening the grate.  
  
"No time to talk son, we have to get you out of here." Major Charles replied. Jarod waited until the guards had moved a few meters from the door before he stood on the bunk and jumped up toward the grate. He caught the edge and pulled himself up with his father and Ethan's help.  
  
Once he was inside the space, they closed the cover and hurried off toward the exit. Major Charles radioed Jordan that all was clear about five minutes before the alarms started going off.  
  
The scrambled out of the vent opening outside the Centre and quickly replaced the hood. Then they ran toward the van.  
  
Just as they reached the van and Jordan opened the doors; they heard shouts behind them.  
  
"Stop right there, Jarod!" Willie cried. Jarod whirled around to see the sweeper pointing his weapon at him. Jarod waved his hands.  
  
"No!" He cried. "Just let them go! I'll come back with you!" He pleaded.  
  
Then the shots rang out. Willie fell to his knees and dropped his gun. He looked about dazed as more shots were fired, disorienting the other sweepers. Jarod turned back and dove inside the van. Ethan slammed the door once he was inside and Emily sped off.  
  
******  
  
Emily applied the ointment to her brother's wounds and then bandaged them. Jarod sat, wincing as she worked, and looking very morose. Emily hugged him when she was done and smiled at him lovingly.  
  
"It's okay now, Jarod." She said softly. He shook his head.  
  
"No, this isn't over yet." He replied gloomily. He rose from his seat and pulled on his shirt. He walked out on the room leaving Emily staring after him.  
  
Jarod grabbed a cellular phone off the kitchen counter and punched in the familiar digits. He walked outside before he heard her voice.  
  
"What?" Miss Parker snapped.  
  
"You have something of mine." Jarod replied solemnly. Miss Parker was silent for a few moments and then chuckled darkly.  
  
"So I have. You put on a hell of a show, Wonderboy." She replied. "So, how did it feel to gun down a sweeper?"  
  
"I didn't shoot Willie; neither did anyone I'm with." He replied. "The shots came from the woods nearby."  
  
"The bullets aren't traceable to anyone at the Centre." She replied. "So who fired them?"  
  
"Who indeed." Jarod said. "That doesn't change the fact that you have something of mine."  
  
"Correction, all that you have." She replied. Jarod nodded to himself.  
  
"So, have you turned it over to the Centre?" He asked.  
  
"No, it's right where you left it." She replied.  
  
"Can I trust you to return the key?" He asked. Again, she was silent for a long pause.  
  
"Maybe." She replied teasingly.  
  
******  
  
Miss Parker paced in front of S-27. He wasn't coming, she knew it. She was just wasting her time while Ratboy was off somewhere laughing at her. Then she heard someone walking up behind her. She spun around to see him.  
  
Jarod smiled as he saw her face. She couldn't suppress a smile as he stopped in front of her. Somehow, she liked seeing him out in the open a lot more than in the depths of the Centre.  
  
Jarod held out his hand and she pulled the key out of her pocket and dropped it into his hand.  
  
"Don't even think I was going to return it in the way I received it." She said sternly, but then broke into a smile. He returned the smile.  
  
"Well, a guy could always dream." He replied.  
  
He opened the lock and rolled the door open. He pulled out his jacket and put it on before grabbing his bag and the silver case. He looked back at her.  
  
"Back to the chase." He said solemnly. She looked at her feet and was going to reply when she heard a shout from behind her.  
  
She whirled around to see Lyle approaching with two sweepers. She turned back to Jarod who had started taking steps in the opposite direction. She thought fast and pulled out her gun.  
  
"Stop or I'll shoot, Jarod!" She cried out. Jarod broke into a run and a sweeper ran past her and around the corner Jarod had turned.  
  
They ran around the storage yard and finally came up empty handed.  
  
******  
  
"Lyle said he saw you handing Jarod something before he opened the storage locker. What was it?" Raines hissed across the T-board. Miss Parker wrung her fingers and looked back at him coolly.  
  
"I don't remember." She snapped. Raines and Lyle looked at one another and then back at her.  
  
"Was it a key?" Lyle shouted. She winced a little. Lyle stood and pointed to a monitor.  
  
On the screen they watched images of Jarod kissing Miss Parker in the lobby. Then, Miss Parker was looking through the storage locker by herself. Then it was her with Jarod in his cell and then just her leaving the cell. Then, her and Jarod as she handed him the key.  
  
The room was silent and all eyes were upon her. Finally she spoke.  
  
"The evidence is pretty damning and speaks for itself." She said and then said nothing more.  
  
******  
  
They kept her in the holding cell adjacent to the T-board for nine more hours before Lyle stepped in.  
  
He held out a sealed bottle of water and Miss Parker took it gratefully. She snapped it open and swallowed a few gulps of the cool liquid before returning her gaze to Lyle's.  
  
"So, are you going to kill me now?" She asked quietly. Lyle shook his head and sat down beside her. He took one of her hands and looked at her with concern she'd never seen in his eyes before.  
  
She felt it then. She felt warmth coming from Lyle, a tender feeling. She never knew that he really cared about her until then.  
  
"You have a chance to prove your loyalty to the Centre, but your not going to like it." Lyle replied. She swallowed hard and looked deeper into her twin's eyes.  
  
"What is it?" She asked, nervously. Lyle sighed heavily.  
  
"Amaru wants a bride." He said plainly.  
  
Her eyes widened.  
  
To Be Continued .  
  
Feedback is Welcome!  
  
melvansickle@earthlink.net 


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